Nuclear Autumn

Nuclear Autumn is the Autumn 2016 special challenge path, introduced on August 15, 2016. This path adds variant rules and restrictions to an ascension run. Its description in The Bureau of Reincarnation reads "The rest of the planet was very recently destroyed by nuclear war, and the Kingdom is experiencing the very early stages of the apocalypse.."

Restrictions

• You may only consume size 1 foods, booze and spleen items. Trying to consume any larger items results in this message:

Your mutated throat is too narrow for a meal that big.

Your mutated throat is too narrow to swallow that much booze. Try something smaller.

That item is too intense for your mutated endocrine system to handle.

Consumables larger than your total capacity (e.g. eating a size 4 or larger food) will give their standard "too full / too drunk / spleen toxins" messages.

• Stomach and Spleen are limited to 3 each, and Liver is limited to 2 (you become overdrunk at 3).
  • Due to only being able to consume size 1 items, you cannot consume a steel margarita to increase your liver capacity.
• Your Fallout Shelter replaces The Campground. As a result, you are unable to access your Garden, Workshed, Telescope, etc.
  • However, your Source Terminal will appear in your shelter, if you have one.
  • You can still access Your Colossal Closet via the chat command: /go closet
  • Although you are kitchenless, you may still install a Dramatic™ range (acquired as a softcore pull) for fancy cooking the unstable fulminate or Knob cake.
• The Meatsmith, The Armory and Leggery, The General Store, Doc Galaktik's Medicine Show, The Hermitage, The Bugbear Bakery, The Black Market, and the three Guild Halls are all unavailable.
  • Although you cannot buy sweet rims from The General Store, you can make a bitchin' meatcar if you pull the rims and get the other pieces from The Degrassi Knoll Bakery and Hardware Store.
  • Although you cannot buy dingy planks from The General Store, you can still use the dinghy plans to construct a dingy dinghy if you can pull the planks.
• You cannot consume quantities of spice melange, Ultra Mega Sour Balls, bottles of alien animal milk, or alien plant pods.

Your mutant metabolism wouldn't be able to process that stuff.

• The Feast of Boris does not grant additional fullness:

  Today is the Feast of Boris.

  But you're not in the mood to celebrate during nuclear autumn

Skills

• Permanent skills are not available.
• Attempting to use an item that teaches a skill gives the message: "You can't read this because the radiation burned off all of the ink."

Divergences

• On ascending into Nuclear Autumn, the player encounters War Apparently Changed.
• You cannot drop the Nuclear Autumn path before day 3 of the run (as of February 1, 2023).
• The Council gives you a Desert Bus pass at level 11.
• The Black Market is unavailable: you find the forged documents when you find the market.

You approach the door of the market and find that it's boarded up. You sigh in frustration as you kick a rock, but then you whoop with excitement as you realize that there were some forged documents hidden under the rock you just kicked!

You acquire an item: forged identification documents

• Some opponents have the adjective "mutant" added to them. These monsters have +20% attack, defense, and HP, and their image is replaced by one of the following:

Fallout Shelter

The Campground is replaced with Your Fallout Shelter which has up to 8 floors. Each Normal run unlocks one more floor, and each Hardcore run unlocks two.

• Floor 1 - Source Terminal, Cryo-Med Chamber
  • If you own a Source Terminal, it appears here. It seems to work just the same as always.
  • The Cryo-Med Chamber cures Radiation Sickness and fully heals HP and MP, but does not allow free resting.
• Floor 2 - Medical Supply
  • Purchase items to deal with radiation sickness: lead umbrella (gain no rads or radiation sickness), Rad-B-Gone (1 lb.) (cures all radiation sickness), Rad-Pro (1 oz.) (20 Adventures of Rad-Pro Tected -- gain no radiation sickness)
• Floor 3 - Spa Simulation Chamber
  • Once per day, grants Spa Day! (+100% to all stats) for 100 turns
• Floor 4 - Electronics Supply
  • Sells Wrist-Boy (allows use of holo-records), Power-Guy 2000 holo-record (10 Adventures of Power, Man -- +100% Mus/Mys/Mox), Shrieking Weasel holo-record (10 Adventures of Shrieking Weasel -- +30 ML), and Superdrifter holo-record (10 Adventures of Superdrifting -- +20% Mus/Mus/Mox exp)
  • Owning a Wrist-Boy is sufficient to use holo-records; Despite being an accessory, it does not need to be equipped. Holo-records are mutually exclusive. Attempting to use a new one while an old one is still in effect will fail with the message: "There's already a record playing on your Wrist-Boy."
• Floor 5 - Chronodynamics Laboratory
  • Once per run: Permanently increases radiation level by 3, speeding up accumulation of both Radiation Sickness and Rads.
• Floor 6 - Gene-Sequencing Laboratory
  • Sells additional rad skills.
• Floor 7 - Underground Record Store
  • Sells additional holo-records: Drunk Uncles holo-record (10 adventures of Drunk and Avuncular -- +100% Adventures from booze), EMD holo-record (10 Adventures of Ministrations in the Dark -- 10% noncombat), Lucky Strikes holo-record (10 Adventures of Lucky Struck -- +20% item), and The Pigs holo-record (10 Adventures of Record Hunger -- +100% Adventures from Food)
• Floor 8 - Main Reactor
  • Once per run: Gain 300 rads.

Skills

Players begin the path with two skills, dependent on class:

Class	Passive Skill	Combat Skill (5 MP)
Seal Clubber	Extra-Thick Skin Reduces physical damage against you by 20%	Comically Oversized Fist Deals physical damage; first use staggers foes
Turtle Tamer	Overactive Pheromones +10 to Familiar Weight	Dislocatable Jaw Deals physical damage
Pastamancer	Aluminum Nerves Regenerate 8-10 MP per Adventure	Noodly Arms Deals physical damage
Sauceror	Self-Lubricating Feet +20% Combat Initiative	Hollow Canines Deal physical damage and heal you
Disco Bandit	Two Right Feet +10% Item Drops from Monsters	Finger Knives Deal physical damage and weaken your enemy
Accordion Thief	Double-Eidetic Memory +10% to all Muscle Gains +10% to all Mysticality Gains +10% to all Moxie Gains	Ultrasonic Ululations Deals physical damage

Additional skills may be acquired by mutating rads that drop from combat.

Rad Sickness

Unfortunately, the nuclear annihilation world is only the start of your problems, as you're left to deal with the fallout - figuratively and literally. As you fight monsters, you'll gradually accumulate Rad Sickness, which reduces your stats.

• Winning a fight against a monster will increase your level of Rad Sickness.
• The amount of Rad Sickness you accrue per fight is based on the number of turns you've spent this given ascension. Fights start giving 0 Rad Sickness, and the number increases by 1 for every 50 adventures thus far spent. For example, if you've played 210 adventures in this particular run, you'll be gaining 4 Rad Sickness per fight.
• The maximum amount of Rad Sickness after combat is 9 at turn 450
• Each point of Rad Sickness reduces your buffed Muscle, Mysticality and Moxie by 1 point.
• Rad Sickness can be cured by resting in your Cryo-Sleep Chamber, located in your Fallout Shelter, using the Clan VIP hot tub or by consuming a bottle of Rad-B-Gone.
• You can block Rad Sickness gain entirely through use of Rad-Pro or a lead umbrella.

Rads

On the bright side, not all of the radiation is strictly bad. Winning combat against monsters also grants you rads, which can be used to purchase various skills.

• You'll acquire (1+X) rad from every fight where X is floor((total fights this run)/50).
• Rads from combat are capped at 10 at turn 450.
• The Protonic accelerator pack will occasionally drop additional rads after combat (~25%).

Name	Type	Price	Effect
Boiling Tear Ducts	Combat 10 MP	30	Hot damage
Projectile Salivary Glands	Combat 10 MP	30	Sleaze damage
Translucent Skin	Combat 10 MP	30	Spooky damage
Skunk Glands	Combat 10 MP	30	Stench damage
Throat Refrigerant	Combat 10 MP	30	Cold damage
Steroid Bladder	Buff 30 MP	60	+50% Muscle
Extra Muscles	Passive	90	+50% Muscle
Magic Sweat	Buff 30MP	60	Damage Absorption +100 Damage Reduction: 10
Flappy Ears	Buff 30MP	60	+2 resistance to all elements
Adipose Polymers	Passive	90	Damage Absorption +100 Damage Reduction: 10
Metallic Skin	Passive	90	+2 resistance to all elements
Hypno-Eyes	Passive	90	+50% Moxie
Self-Combing Hair	Buff 30 MP	60	+50% Moxie
Intracranial Eye	Buff 30 MP	60	+50% Mysticality
Mind Bullets	Combat 10 MP	60	Stuns opponent for 3 rounds
Extra Brain	Passive	90	+50% Mysticality
Internal Soda Machine	Noncombat	30	Spend 20 meat to recover 10 MP
Extra Kidney	Passive	60	+100% Adventures from booze
Extra Gall Bladder	Passive	60	+100% adventures from food

The Gene-Sequencing Laboratory on level 6 of Your Fallout Shelter allows you to get additional skills:

Name	Type	Price	Effect
Magnetic Ears	Buff 10 MP	90	+15% Items from Monsters
Sucker Fingers	Passive	120	+15% Items from Monsters
Extremely Punchable Face	Buff 30 MP	90	+30 ML
Firefly Abdomen	Buff 30 MP	90	+10% combat rate
Bone Springs	Buff 30 MP	90	+20% Combat Initative
Squid Glands	Buff 30 MP	90	-10% combat rate
Backwards Knees	Passive	120	+20% Combat Initative

Strategy

• Nuclear Autumn/Hardcore Strategy

Rewards

• Finishing a Nuclear Autumn run that began while it was still the current special challenge path -- that is, between August 15th, 2016, and November 14th, 2016 -- gives players 100 (in Hardcore) or 50 (in Normal) extra karma points the next time they visit Valhalla.
• Players will receive a Thwaitgold cockroach statuette upon defeating the Naughty Sorceress (3). Players in Hardcore get the appropriate stainless steel equipment for their class.
• Players that defeated the Naughty Sorceress while the path was current got an Adventurer bobblehead.

References

• The name of this path is a play on nuclear winter.
• The intro adventure, path reward, and new campground are all references to the Fallout videogame series.

Ascension Paths
Boozetafarian	Teetotaler	Oxygenarian
Special Challenge Paths
Spring Summer Fall Winter 2011 None Bees Hate You Way of the Surprising Fist Trendy 2012 Avatar of Boris Bugbear Invasion Zombie Slayer Class Act 2013 Avatar of Jarlsberg BIG! KOLHS Class Act II: A Class For Pigs 2014 Avatar of Sneaky Pete Slow and Steady Heavy Rains Picky 2015 Actually Ed the Undying One Crazy Random Summer Community Service None 2016 Avatar of West of Loathing The Source Nuclear Autumn None 2017 Gelatinous Noob License to Adventure Live. Ascend. Repeat. None 2018 Pocket Familiars G-Lover Disguises Delimit None 2019 Dark Gyffte Two Crazy Random Summer Kingdom of Exploathing None 2020 Path of the Plumber Low Key Summer Grey Goo None 2021 You, Robot Quantum Terrarium Wildfire None 2022 Grey You Journeyman Fall of the Dinosaurs None 2023 Avatar of Shadows Over Loathing Legacy of Loathing A Shrunken Adventurer am I None 2024 WereProfessor 11 Things I Hate About U Avant Guard None 2025 Z is for Zootomist Hat Trick 11,037 Leagues Under the Sea None